 I'm calling the meeting to order. Welcome to the Development Review Board meeting for February 21st. We will go through the items on the agenda in the order in which they appear. We don't have any changes to the agenda, correct, Mary? There are three items on the agenda. Communications, all of the communications have been posted online, correct, Mary? That is correct. The minutes from the last meeting, any board members should communicate with AJ if you have any edits. But those have been posted, I see. And we have one item on consent agenda, and that is for ZP2327655 Spear Street. Do we have the applicant here? Do you want to come up here? Have you had a chance to read the staff report? Yeah, yes, thank you. And do you have any concerns with the staff report or the conditions included within them? No concerns with the staff report, no concerns with the condition. And I just want to note that condition one and two we've already met. Great. And are there any objections from the board on treating this as a consent item? Do I have a motion? I move that we approve ZP2327655 Spear Street and adopt staff's recommendations. Chase, seconds. All those in favor? Unanimous. Five. OK, thank you. Thank you. Next up is ZAP-23-1, which is 126 College Street. This is an appeal of a zoning denial. Do we have the appellant here? Yes. OK. And then, Mary, as an appeal, the city goes first. Is that correct? Yes. OK. Do you want to come up here? Yeah, we're all going to speak. OK. I think do you have an order that you plan on? I can swear you all in now and then we'll decide. No, I don't think we have an order. OK. So if you plan to speak on this matter, which is ZAP-23-1, please raise your right hand and swear. Do you swear to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing, but the truth under pain and penalty of perjury? All right, Mary. OK, I admittedly am not the project manager who's on vacation this week. But I'm happy to speak on behalf of the staff report for this appeal. So the appeal is for an administrative denial of a wall sign for an office on a fourth floor. The sign standards offer dimensional requirements for first-floor tenants and a smaller dimensional standard for second-floor tenants. There is no guidance for signs above the second floor. It is expressly for first and second floor. And I refer you to section 7.2.13 for wall signs. So the standard for wall signs is for first and second floor tenants. It's important to note that second floor tenants have a much smaller dimension allowable for wall signs. Upper-floor tenants do have an option for either a directory sign or a window sign or a door sign, a window sign in a door for stairs leading upstairs. But otherwise are not permissible. Wall signs are not permissible for anything over the second floor. The applicant has raised an opportunity about a maximum area for wall signs and believes that they are subject to those standards. But it does not make sense to utilize those dimensional standards, which would be 15% or 200 square feet maximum for the entire building. It simply doesn't make sense that a fourth floor tenant could get more signage than a first or second floor tenant. So the application was administratively denied and the applicant has appealed in a timely manner. Before we turn over so they apologize. I have a question, Mary. Yes. So are there two separate issues, one of them, can they do a wall sign and how big can it be? Are they not both? You're saying it doesn't expressly prohibit them to have a wall sign. So that implies they could have a wall sign. They have applied for a wall sign for a fourth floor and the ordinance does not anticipate wall signs for fourth floors. They only offer the standard as for first and second floor signage for a wall sign. Your reports though, whoever wrote, you didn't write the report, right? Scott wrote the report. Scott wrote the report. I'm just, you know, he says wall signs does not expressly prohibit wall signs for fourth floor tenants. But there's no provision for a wall sign above the second floor. I'm just trying to think of stores on fourth floors or with signs. And I admit, I don't know of them, but it seems that there must be some. I guess Mary, are you aware of any signs for businesses or stores on third or fourth floors? Now these signed regulations were adopted in September of 2019. There may be wall signs that have been in existence that were permitted under previous regulations. We have had a prior administrative denial for a wall sign for a business located above the second floor. I have an alternate meeting of that section of the ordinance that means it's just speaking about where on a building it could be located, not where the tenant is. So it can only be located on the first or second floor. But it doesn't matter where the tenant is located, I'm trying to understand that. The dimensions that are provided are first for a first floor tenant, ground floor. And then for a second floor tenant with only a door access, there are guidance for those dimensional standards, which are significantly smaller. And then it is silent after that. You're meeting the height provision separate from the area of the vision. We're reading somewhere where the second floor starts and stops somewhere at the second floor. Yeah, I mean, it says specifications. The height is no higher than the floor level of the second story. That's for the installation of a sign. But that's not for the location of the tenancy, which is defined. First floor tenants are allowed this. Second floor tenants with only an entryway are allowed this. Start off, just come up to the microphone. So yes, I start. But can you state your name? Julia Booth with ICB. If we are to submit a master sign plan, how would you like that to be submitted? What would make everybody happy? There are directions within the ordinance for what's required for a master sign plan. OK. But can you give anything else besides that? Any more recommendations or anything? So I know that Scott did offer to the appellant an opportunity for a master sign plan, which would allow flexibility in review of the sign standards. A master sign plan would come before the Development Review Board. So that would be your submission to the DRB. OK. OK. I guess to back Julia, it's not clear as to what would be approved by the DRB if this is denied. And I read this on Thursday that says potentially a band sign or Tom, by the way, from Design Signs, I didn't say that. You'll need to come to the table so you can be recorded here, please. It's not amplifying as recording for the record, so. Tom from Design Signs. So if this is denied, what are our options? It's not clear as to the verbiage in that letter today as to what path we have to take to make everybody happy. ICV, Vermont Law, myself. What can we do to proceed forward that would be permissible for an option for everybody? Well, I'll just note that. We haven't denied anything yet. So it is impossible. Thank you. Thank you. I don't want to get off from this topic, but this is going to happen more and more. There are other tenants that are above the second floor. I'm actually have several of these in the works right now, and we'll probably be talking again. But this is something probably isn't for the DRB, but for planning or somebody, that conversation. Why it happened in 2019? What caused that change? I'm not quite sure, but there are other tenants that are going to be looking for space on wall signs, and it doesn't have to be to the same size or standard of the first floor tenant, but it is something that others are going to be seeking for sure. So the Part 3 for Master Sign Plans offers flexibility in some areas, but not at all. So take a look at 7.3.1 through 7.3.4, and it will tell you exactly where there can be flexibility. And all Master Sign Plans are at the discretion of the Development Review Board. Right, which I guess is where I'm a little, you know, I guess I don't know what to come back with since it's discretionary. What can we do that? Well, then you'll need to make yourself familiar with this section, though. I don't know what you're proposing. I don't know what the DRB would be looking at, and I'm not certain where you're seeking flexibility. It's not an absolutely open portal to do whatever you like. I understand, yeah. I think you can definitely consider what is allowable and what's allowable in different locations, like the standards for the first floor. Shouldn't be going bigger than that. There's a little guidance for you. But yeah, I think that in terms of today's appeal, the question for the appellant is, you know, is there additional argument that you would like to put forward to the board as we consider the appeal? Not that I have to say, but you might want to state. They would like to speak. If you looked at the sign ordinance, it would give you some guidance. Yes. For instance, it says individual signs may vary from locational standards of the article. However, no individual sign may exceed the maximum error limitations of the specified type. So you've got some guidance in here. It's not like you've got nothing to go by. If you look at this, you would be able to come up with something that you wanted to do. There's guidance, but not necessarily for the scenario, which is not for this scenario. There's not a lot of guidance. I read these pretty regularly, so I'm fairly well versed in them. And I don't see a lot of guidance helping me for a fourth floor tenant come to you with a particular. Well, you can do a wall sign and figure out how big you can make it, and then put everybody onto that wall sign, for instance. A band sign, not a wall sign, right? And that scenario says, master sign for the building. For the building. For the building, yeah. Yeah. OK. I like them. Yep. Speak up. Hi. My name is Beth McCormack. I'm the dean of Vermont Law School. With me today is Lorraine Atwood. She's our vice president of finance. We really want this wall sign, and we got this property because we wanted a wall sign. We used to have another space in Burlington, and we had a wall sign, and we left that property to pursue this larger space because we wanted to not just have an office in Burlington, but to have a real presence in Burlington as part of our strategic initiatives. And even more importantly, we have an immigration clinic at this space, and we want that wall sign so that the client's most in need of legal services in Burlington can find us easily. We don't see anything within the provision 7.1, 0.2, 0.13 that prevents having a fourth floor wall sign. There's just no language in there at all that says a fourth floor tenant can't have a wall sign. There is a list in that section of prohibited signs, and fourth floor tenants are not listed on there as prohibited signs. So we don't see any language that prevents a fourth floor tenant from having a wall sign. There is language that specifically references first floor and second floor tenant signs, but there's nothing that prevents a fourth floor sign. So given that ambiguity and given how important this is in providing legal services to underrepresented individuals in Burlington, we ask you to allow us to have a sign of some size at the wall level. It is truly the reason that we got and pursued this space, and we think it will only benefit Burlington to have our increased presence in Burlington. We plan, we hope that the wall sign will allow for foot traffic for those that need legal services, and we also think that having a presence of Vermont Law School, the state's only law school in Burlington is helpful to the city overall. So those are our main arguments in support of a finding that we could have a fourth floor wall sign. Anything to add? No, just that we were very disappointed we couldn't have a sign, and I want to stress that we moved to Burlington with a wall sign and I think it was on St. Paul Street. It was very effective in creating a good atmosphere at the law school in our community. And so this sign is very important to us. Now, upon moving there, we understand that Burlington is facing a hard to rent office space. So here we are trying to rent this office space and we have a short term, not a short term, but a five term lease. And if this office can't get us what we need, it's a shame that, because we really like Burlington. So, and it's just a great location for us. There are no other wall signs there right now from the first or second floor tenants, I think that's true. And we have about more than 10% of the building, more than 10% of the square footage of that entire building is rented by us as a fourth floor tenant. Right. Any questions from the board? We only want to improve the area and after we moved into the building and had the lease, someone who was one of our vendors said, I'm surprised you moved here because of the location next to the park. The city's position that it seems illogical that a fourth floor tenant could have a bigger sign than a second floor tenant. So the sign that you've proposed, I think is bigger than what would otherwise be. Did the other tenants ask for signs? Eight square. Eight square. Okay. I don't know if the other tenants even wanted signs. So I don't know. I mean, it's a matter of what you want rather than, I don't know. It wasn't, we weren't competing with anybody. He's referring to what's allowable for a second floor tenant, not what's existing there for a second floor tenant. Yeah, it's less than that. Yeah, we were trying to work with ICV with the right dimensions and stuff. The size is less important to us than having the sign there. And we understand these regulations are relatively new, but if fourth floor tenants weren't supposed to have wall signs, then why aren't they listed in the prohibited signs within that regulation? It's my question. It's not like there's any provision that says only first floor and second floor tenants can have wall signs. Questions for the appellant? Is there anyone else who wishes to speak on this? Jim Langen from DINSEY. Yeah, I just want to make a couple points, I guess, in response to the staff report. I agree with the staff report that the wall signs need to comply with the standards that are written. And as I've heard from the board and was stated before, there is no prohibition on wall signs based on the tenant location. I read the regulation here as providing three sets of specifications for height, for depth, and for area. For the first two, for the height and the depth, there's no mention of the location of the tenant for what the required height or the depth would be. And so I read those as for the height and for the depth, there's no tenant-based requirement for the sign. There is mention of tenant location for area. And so we're not requesting that no standard for area be assigned because we're not first or second floor, we're just asking that it be accepted. And the denial said no signs at all for fourth floor tenant. And so I don't think that's what the regulations say. I'm just curious. So you've got no lighting proposed as part of this? I don't believe so. Oh, yep. No, I was just kidding. No, we don't. No lighting. I was just asking. That's a good idea though. We could work it in if you'd like us. Well, you may have to come back for that. Jim, I'm struggling with the ordinance. I mean, we have many buildings where there are many floors. And so it just seems strange to me to think that you wouldn't have addressed the other floors. The ordinance was drafted in a way to address the first and second floor. And the assumption of applied or not is that beyond that, there's no sign allowed. Otherwise, do you need to talk about every single floor? Well, it's just if the intention is for, it's just the identity, like where your renting space within the building seems to really have no point to the regulations, like why that matters to, you know, it's not even mentioned in the height requirement, but it's mentioned in the area requirement, which seems odd. I admittedly struggled reading it. So what's the intention here? And I also struggle in what's the city's interest here in saying who inside this building is allowed to have a sign and who isn't. Seems, if that's the position, it does seem to me like that was the intent. It wasn't to bar signs from certain. I think it may have been an intention to, you know, if we're limiting the height, sort of how high up on the building this sign can be, you know, maybe the assumption was nobody above that level is gonna wanna sign. Maybe that's why it's omitted. I mean, I think part of the intention is if every individual tenant comes before the DRB for a sign, then the building could potentially be covered in wall signs. And I think that's why the intent is that there's a master sign plan. If there's a max allowance for the building, it really wouldn't matter. Once you get maxed, you're done. Try to put 20 tenants, I get what you're saying. We wouldn't wanna have a building with a bunch of signs, but two get there real quick, then it depends on the allowance, 18%. It would also seem that with this sign for a multi-tenant building that, from my point of view, you would be setting a direction for what? If you did have a master sign plan, that this would be setting a tone for it. If there were any other signs that would have to be on this, follow this design precedent, not in terms of size, but in terms of style and everything else, which is nothing wrong with that, but it is, that's the whole intent of a master plan, that master sign permit is that if you do have multi-tenants, you sort of set up the criteria at the beginning, but in a way you'll be doing it almost retroactively if we did approve this, that other tenants would be expected. It would seem to follow this style. I mean, that would be sort of for the landlord can decide that if they're setting that for their building. Well, signs are very important for our business, so I just wanna reiterate that, it's very important for us to have the sign. I think it'd be great if there's more signs in a building means it's more active and the space is rented. So I know everyone wants that. Just to clarify, this wasn't a blanket denial of signage. They requested a wall sign and were denied for a wall sign. That was all. Understood, but it wasn't a denial. In fact, I think there was encouragement to consider either a window sign or a directory sign or a master sign plan. So, the advocate. I guess my point, I guess my point, Mary, wasn't that it was an outright denial of any sign, but it was a denial of, it was based on the tenants location, not saying it was too big or that it was too high or that it was too thick or it was lighted or something else. But it was for a wall sign. But it was for a wall sign, correct. We were advised to go this path. We weren't told to do a master sign plan. The late sign wasn't an option, the abandoned sign wasn't an option. This was the path that we were told to go for. We weren't advised to do a master sign plan. Right, and when we were looking for buildings, we were looking for a building that would have signs on the wall so that we could do it. We'll probably do it right here. I think there were other people who wanted to comment on this. You haven't sworn them in, but they're part of the law school. Can you come up? Thank you. So I'll swear you in and then you can share your comments. Is there anyone else while I'm doing this that wants to speak on this matter? Okay. Can you raise your right hand? Do you swear that your testimony tonight is true, nothing but the truth, and underpains and penalty of perjury? Yes. Thank you. And can you state your name and your address so you can be included in the correspondence about this? Yes, I'm Misha Altman, and I'm Jill Martin Diaz. My pronouns are they, them, and we work at 126 College. I also live at 354 Manhattan in middle North Den. Mary, do you want their mailing addresses or is the work address? If they signed in, we will have them. Thank you. Thank you. My pronouns are also they, them. Good evening. I'm a master's student in restorative justice at Vermont Law and Graduate School. I work closely with Professor Jill Martin Diaz, who's the lead attorney at the Vermont Immigration Assistance, which is located at 126 College Street, and shares space with Vermont Law's Burlington Office of Admissions. And I am speaking to advocate for the inclusion of this proposed sign, while the denial, the initial denial is based on Article 7's provisions. It has been stated that those limitations mentioned first and second floors and not fourth floors, but this has all been previously discussed. So I actually want to talk about the human impact that the lack of this signage causes. So the building at 126 College Street is set further back than the other buildings on the block. So it's harder to find. The first time I went to the office for a client meeting, I had to walk up and down the block twice to find the building. And more than one student since has commented to me that it's sketchy that they never would have found the building if somebody who was familiar with the location hadn't been with them at the time. So if this building is hard for law and graduate students to locate, I can only imagine how difficult it would be for Burlington's low income English learning immigrant population who need free legal help. How hard, difficult it would be for them to find. As stated, this office houses the Vermont Immigration Assistance Project where Burlington immigrants can meet with no cost legal counsel. Because they have been unable to find the building, multiple clients have asked the attorneys to meet them at other landmarks and then be walked to the building. These clients are hoping to become permanent Burlington residents and we want them to feel safe and welcome when visiting our office. So the lack of street visible signage creates additional barriers for legal assistance to folks who already have limited access. So for these reasons we respectfully request a reversal of the denial for this signage. Thank you. I have a question, I'm just admittedly a little baffled. It's got a big 126 above the door. That's what, 18 inches high? I'm just curious how do people not find the building? We can go first, I'll see if I have anything to add. I mean, yes, it does say 126. Like I said, it is set back further. I think that that is possibly a part of it and because the walls kind of jut out, I think that that's a big purpose for having that wall sign. But yeah, it was difficult for me and I am proficient in Google Maps. Thank you. The glass is extremely reflective too on that building. What does make for the difficulty? It's true and it's just a generally kind of, that kind of environment walking up, you have to be facing the building dead on to see the numbers. It's reflective and imposing. You're an English learning person who's experienced trauma and is coming to my office not to talk about good things. And it's been difficult for folks to find us. The only thing I'll add, I think Misha's testimony was so spot on. Just as a Burlington homeowner and taxpayer and resident and program manager, I'm really proud that my city is devoting so many resources to promoting equity and inclusion and belonging for Vermont's diverse population and Burlington's diverse population. Burlington is home to almost three quarters of the state's non-citizen population. Our program is the only free legal health that this population relies on. This isn't work that Vermont Legal Aid or Legal Services Vermont provides. And I think this is a great opportunity to look past the rigid rule of law. You're looking at these words and thinking the words are they're not providing us with the pathway that we need to achieve the just result. That's exactly what equity and inclusion requires. It requires us to look at the human impact and to push the rigidity of words when they're not serving us with just outcomes. So thank you. Thank you. We will probably deliberate on this tonight. So with that, we're closing the public hearing and we will move on to our final agenda item which is ZP-23-998 Sunset Cliff Road. Do we have the applicant here for that matter? Hi. Anyone else here to speak on that matter? We just swear you all in all at once. You can say where you are for swearing in and then when you come up to speak if you can just come up to the microphone. So if you raise your right hand, do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth on this matter under pain and penalty of perjury? Thank you. Do you want to give us a little bit of an overview? We've obviously looked through the materials but if there's an overview that you want to provide and then we can jump in with questions. Advisory board meeting. But I'll just sort of summarize quickly. The proposal, I represent the owners Kean Lucy Wong, I'm Elizabeth Herman, the architect on the project. The proposal is to remove the existing house at the property and build a new home in its stead. The, our proposal pushes the house quite a bit further away from the lake to alleviate some of the, it gives us more space. I mean, we have more space for our NOMO zone, a little bit more usable space along the lake side and the other house was quite close. So in addition to that, we are also proposing a path down to the water. The current house, it has, does not have a, an above ground path to the water. It has a tunnel that the owner fashioned, I don't know when, but it's a 50 foot subterranean tunnel that pops out on the lake. It's something we wanna remove and replace with something that is above ground. So other than that, I think we, you probably read on the report as well that the conservation board asked for a bit more information. I think we have Seth Goddard here from Cubs and Lansing who can tell you a little bit about stormwater management and the progress that's been made there. And we also have our landscape architects, Keith Wagner and Rem Heelman here to talk about the landscape plan. If you have any other questions, we have our plan. I imagine you have all the drawings successful to you on laptops. At some point, I think the conservation board had some comments about soil types and I know they did the, they got the reports back and so they talked about something about sensitive infiltration issues or something like that. I'm gonna let Seth take it away here. Yeah, sure, I'll come up. I'm Seth Goddard with Cubs and Lansing, the civil engineer on the job. So the conservation board just wanted to make sure that stormwater was being treated properly on the site. And so after the meeting, we went out and did some soil test holes and the soil on the site was pretty crappy. It was fill soil and below it was clay. So infiltration is not possible on this site. So what we're doing is a bioretention that's designed to underdrain to treat the water quality storm along with other disconnection practices which is really typical in this section of when you're abutting the lake. We have submitted a plan and design plan and an application to the city stormwater division. So we're just waiting for our response from them to finalize the plan. So we don't have that plan in front of us? You have the, the stormwater plan is actually in our site plan. That shows the bioretention area. It also shows all the stormwater flow direction disconnection areas on that plan as well. So the soils above the clay pan or like some sort of fill that was put there? It looks like when that original house was built, they probably took all the soil that was excavated and just put it on the site. Yeah, there was about two feet of it that was just clearly fill soil. There was some concrete that was mixed in there, brick. So the clay pan is pretty pervasive and it's only about three or four feet low ground? That's probably about three feet, two and a half to three feet. We dug two test holes in the front of the, in the front yard and then two towards the lake and we found the same thing in each one. I'm just, Mary, do you know, we would have a plan, a Crips and Lansing plan, right? That's what I'm looking for. That right, Seth? Yeah, there should be one that has been uploaded. Am I missing it, Mary? Yeah, I'm not seeing it either. The site plans. Let me look. All the site plans are. Very nice, beautiful Wagner plans, but. Wow. I don't know if you should. There should be one. Yeah, that's as our title block and says site plan on it. I wonder if, yeah, I think Nick just uploaded the most recent one just a few hours ago. So we could. Do you have a copy of that here? I've got an 11 by 17. I think I'm just wondering if we want to have at least that for deliberative. Yeah, absolutely. And ask you to file it because I don't see us having one. Did you find one, Sean? No, yeah. I'll just mention that we, Crips and Lansing just sent us an updated plan today that had a few minor changes from our last iteration that was posted. And so we removed that old version and replaced it earlier today. There's some small changes in the lot size calculation that Seth can tell you about. The lot is actually bigger than what was previously stated. And the setbacks are 13 feet, not 14. Based on the 10% of lot width. And can explain those to you right now. So the lot is widest at where it meets sunset Cliff Road. And then it narrows down significantly as it goes to the lake. And so our setback was, we took the average width at sunset Cliff Road and then at the lakeside edge of the house. And then took 10% of that. If the DRB would refresh their web pages, you'll see the plans that were just submitted. Okay. And the other item on the law area is that the lot lines, technically the owner owns down to Lake elevation 95 five. And so we just updated that area to reflect that. I'm not seeing either. Is it included with the site plans now? Any other questions while we wait for that? Just to summarize the rest of what we were doing on this. There's also a state water and wastewater permit that's been applied for. It has municipal connections, but we're increasing the flows. This is more a curiosity question. You have the two sidings, they have the more natural and you have the back. Four of the siding, right? The two different sidings on the house. Yeah, right, right. And is the natural one, what happens is my own. Yeah, there's sort of, right. The sort of shadows are the, yeah. That's what I thought. I just having trouble reading it from here. Yes, right. I'm okay with it. Anyone else? Any other questions? You always ask about it. You want this? I don't see what it is anyway. Giving you your opportunity. I still want to see the plan, but if, you know, I don't know what happened to it. So we'll take your 11 by 17, if that's all right with you, Seth. Absolutely. Yeah. I think it sounds like you might be getting it, but yeah. And no one else wants to speak on that. No other questions? Okay. I am closing the public hearing and that is the last item on our agenda. So we will adjourn and go into deliberative. Mary, that's your warning. I think you guys just push that.